Category Archives: technique

Apologies for the lack of recent blog posts; we’ve welcomed a Schnoodle puppy into our home and posting on Facebook better suits my sleep-deprived attention span… But I have managed to make a new batch of sketchbooks; they’re still bound … Continue reading →

I love the way urban sketching explicitly celebrates the different ways we respond to a location. Here’s an example from Monday when I had the opportunity to sketch in Bath with Gary Yeung (a member of the USK Hong Kong … Continue reading →

A GIF-tastic round-up of some recent sketches, mostly of Bath, showing how water-colour works with drawings done in bamboo dip-pen and coloured ink. I love the way that the coloured ink lines can fade back into the sketch or be brought forward, … Continue reading →

My current favourite mark-maker is a bamboo dip pen. I love the free-flowing lines that can wander around the page, and it’s great for ‘blind drawing’ of foliage, clouds etc. It delivers big juicy lines that can merge into forms if you … Continue reading →

Here’s my new homemade pocket palette. It cost about £8 and two hours to make, weighs almost nothing (53 grams or less than 2 ozs, including paint…) and has lots of room for pigments and mixing. It’s small enough to be part of … Continue reading →

I’ve tried using concertina/accordion-fold sketchbooks in the past, but found them very awkward to use when out and about. They’re usually spineless (like this Seawhite version and my homemade one below) with no hinge between the covers, so you can’t use a … Continue reading →

More domestic than urban, some quick pencil and watercolour sketches from the late night kitchen, trying to break my over-reliance on dilute Lexington grey for tone/shadow! Although the grey ink wash is very fast and effective for quick shadows, it can make … Continue reading →